[FRIAM] PhDs and curiosity

[Prof David West]

Can't speak to germs, but the cultural half is, I believe, dead on.

Two of the most pervasive aspects of culture are "worldview" and "language." Sometime after the Age of Reason, Western Industrial culture adopted a worldview of the Universe as a machine (clockworks, steam engines, computers) exemplified by 19th century physics of La Place and Mach. (All that pesky quantum stuff was kept in the closet almost to the 1950s.) Physics dominated the University and all the new disciplines that came into existence wanted to be just like Physics. Business adopted the machine metaphor and touted "scientific management." Computer Science and Software Engineering. Sociology split from Anthropology (actually more of a parallel development) based on the former's desire to be more scientific and experimental. Cognitive 'Science' tried to subsume much of psychology, tolerating Freud and eschewing Jung. Philosophy moved to Logical Positivism and its successor Analytic Philosophy.

All of this, mostly, non-consciously; the same way that culture influences the behavior of those within it.

Had a great conversation with a History of Science professor the other day about how misogyny became entangled in the 'scientific' and still manifests itself in language, behaviors, and worldview of the university as a whole.

davew


On Tue, May 27, 2025, at 3:11 PM, glen wrote:
> So, with the recent conversations about when an LLM might be considered 
> alive and the extent to which some/all PhD programs represent 
> intelligence/knowledge, I landed on this question:
>
> Is curiosity-driven science like germ-line genetics, whereas 
> ideals/values-driven science is like cultural inheritance?
>
> The analogy seems OK to me. Nothing short of significant trauma can 
> divert the curious. But a cultural value/ideal (including things like 
> capitalism or whatnot) seems like it could pretty easily fade beyond 1 
> or 2 generations. Please trash this idea! I want to use it at the pub. 
> But if it doesn't pass muster, here, I may not. >8^D
>
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